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In 1933, he told Georg Schneevoigt, the conductor who was supposed to lead the symphony's world premiere in Helsinki: "You have no idea how brilliant it is." Later that year, he explained to a journalist that the Eighth "will be the reckoning of my whole existence - 68 years. The piece never appeared, despite letters Sibelius wrote to his friends discussing its structure. An Eighth Symphony was promised to Serge Koussevitzky, conductor of the Boston Symphony Orchestra, in the early 1930s, and its British premiere was even announced for 1933. Sibelius premiered seven symphonies in his lifetime, pieces that are among the most popular yet misunderstood of any composer, the last coming in 1924. In fact, that silence may not have been as total as we think. It's a creative silence all but unparalleled in music. For the last 30 years of his life, Sibelius - the father of Finnish music and, at that time, the most famous Finn alive, celebrated the world over with performances of his orchestral music, and one of the few living composers to be almost universally loved - did not produce any major works. Everything in the house has been left almost as it was when he died, 50 years ago today: his white suit, in which he was often photographed in the last years of his life, hangs from the door of his study his pens lie on his desk and the phonograph sits in the library, where he spent much of his last years listening to recordings of his music by conductors such as Thomas Beecham and Leopold Stokowski.īut that fireplace holds the secret to one of the great mysteries in the history of music. You half expect Sibelius himself to come out from his office and greet you, then sit down at his piano and wave you to a seat. Such is the clarity of the design of the house, the restrained chic of the textiles, even the crockery, that Ainola feels strangely contemporary. For any visitor to Ainola today - the house is named after Sibelius's wife, Aino - the fireplace is a colourful interloper in an interior otherwise completely made of pine.
SIBELIUS COMPOSER WINDOWS
Every brick has been carefully glazed, reflecting the light that streams in through the front windows like an evergreen glimpsed in a wintry woodland. In Jean Sibelius's house, about half an hour north of Helsinki and within sight of haunting Lake Tuusula, there is a massive green fireplace, the height of the dining room.